Mado and Her Sons
As everyone knew, Orks reproduced through spores as a kind of biological weapon. When their hair, flakes of skin, or even sweat and saliva fell to the ground, the spores would soon begin growing into mushroom-like growths in a suitable environment. Beneath those mushrooms, connected by mycelium, eggs would grow deep underground—and inside each egg was a brand-new Ork!
Under normal circumstances, before the Orks had finished growing, other close relatives and symbiotic creatures might hatch first, such as squigs and Gretchin.
But the first batch of Orks appeared in Dragonbone Village before any of their close relatives or symbiotic creatures could hatch. That was because the mouthful of raw "spores" that Mado had accidentally spat out had been optimized and accelerated by Annie.
That's right!
Maybe the soil was just too fertile?
At any rate, barely twenty days later, the first batch of Orks had successfully hatched.
They had just crawled out of the ground and were still juveniles, not fully grown yet. They would probably need to take in nutrients for some time before they could mature into battle-ready war forms. Even so, several hundred naked, chubby little green "boys" had gathered together, and their chorus of overlapping "WAAAGH!!!" cries had spread across all of Dragonbone Village, rousing White Moon Kui, Boss White.
"You!"
"Make way!"
"Boss White's here!"
"Move! Move! Everybody, make way!"
"Boss White!"
"Hello, Boss White!"
In the woods at the lowest point along the stream in Dragonbone Village, the nearby villagers and Awakened ones on guard had made way. After bringing Xia Dou, Mado, Sui Xing, Tasia, Fang Yuan, Shan Da, Xu Tong, and Gu Yan with her, White Moon Kui finally got a clear look at the little Orks. The villagers and Awakened ones had surrounded them. They were